Grandeur of the Seas

Lorrie

We sailed the Grandeur of the Seas, August 23, 2003, leaving from Harwich
England.

We bought air through RCI which included transfers. They were waiting for
passengers at the airport, downstairs from the customs area at Gatwick. They
will ask to take your luggage and you won't see it again for hours. If you need
something earlier keep it with you. The bus ride to the port at Harwich is 2 1.2
hours. Our bus had broken a/c so it was a very uncomfortable ride. Check in at
the port went quickly and we were able to get into our cabin at 12:00 p.m. which
is when we arrived.

Sunday was a sea day as we sailed to Oslo. The North Sea had 8-13 foot swells so
it was a bit rough. We enjoy this though!! There is a lot of ship traffic in the
North Sea and Baltic which is interesting. We had our Cruise Critic party at
11:45 which was a lot of fun meeting those we had been talking with for months!

Monday we arrived in Oslo to sunny skies and 65 degrees. We were off the ship at
7:10 a.m. We do all the ports independently. We didn't dock where we were
supposed to by the fort, but instead at the ferry terminal. We walked into town
and found tram #12 and took it to Vigeland Park & sculpture garden. It went to
Frogner and stopped due to construction, but it was only a 5 minute walk to the
park. The tickets for trams and buses are expensive, $4.30 per ticket, good for
l hour. We ended up using it for 2 hours with no one checking. It was 8 a.m. and
the park had few people in it. People on bikes riding to work and a few
gardeners. It was so peaceful, a wonderful way to enjoy it before bus loads of
people arrived! From the road directly in front of the park we caught bus #20
and rode it to Bus #30 line. The drivers will help you if you ask which stop to
get off at. We then took bus #30 straight to the Fram museum. We used our
original bus ticket for all 3 of these rides. It would be best to get an Oslo
card which covers admissions and transport. We didn't since I couldn't find it
that early. You can buy this ahead of time on-line and not worry about wasting
time looking for it early in the morning. The Fram opens at 9 a.m. so it's
important to go here first. The ships papers said it opened later, ignore this.

At 9:30 we walked next door to the Kon Tiki museum. Both these museums are worth
seeing. A 15 minute walk from here brings you to the Viking Ship museum which
has 3 old Viking ships. This was the least impressive museum of the 3, although
it has a huge parking lot so this is where the cruise ship tours come. We then
walked to the Outdoor Norwegian Folk museum. This is only a 5-6 minute walk from
the Viking museum. We enjoyed it a lot, although some houses were closed.

We then ferried across the bay to the main harbor and walked to the City Hall.
City Halls are very important sights in these countries. We were able to see the
wood carvings outside and the first floor, but the important 2nd floor was
closed due to election day. We were told it had been open in the morning. From
here it's a 10 minute walk to the National Museum where we saw "The Scream" and
Munch's other paintings. This is a free museum but you must check your backpack
in free lockers. We then walked down Karl Jhons Gate, not to attractive, but
found a department store selling tourist items. I bought a troll that I loved!
Get the paperwork to get the VAT back. They are very good returning it on the
ship just before you sail as long as you have the paperwork. They give you the
refund in US$'s.

We then went to the Cathedral, then to the Akershus Fortress where the Norwegian
Resistance Museum is. It is a good museum, but the English is written in small
letters and it's a dark museum, so is difficult to concentrate on. I liked the
resistance museum in Copenhagen better. We had walked for 8 hours but had seem
so much! This is a very expensive city. Cherries $9 lb., slice of chocolate cake
$10, child’s t-shirt $30, postcard, $1.25 for one, Ouch!! We sat at the back of
this ship on deck 5 to watch our sail away, past beautiful small islands with
summer homes on them, don't miss this!

Tues. Sea Day We slept a lot, catching up still and getting ready for the hectic
schedule to come.
Wed. Stockholm Heavy rain in the a.m. but cleared at 10:30 am. 65 degrees

Beautiful islands sailing into Stockholm. We arrived at 9 a.m. so had time to
enjoy the sail in. There is a Tourist Info Office right at the dock in a small
red building. We bought the Stockholm card here. This is a good buy at 220
crown. Again, the admissions add up. We walked in the downpour to Slussen Ferry
Dock for the ferry to Djurgarden where the Vasa museum is located. It is an
easy, but 25 minute walk to the ferry. Get off the ship and walk along the water
toward town. You could take the ships bus to town and if it's summer take a
different ferry over, which wasn't running in late august, or take the bus from
there. We were dropped of the ferry at Tivoli and walked 5 minutes to the Vasa.
It opens at 10:00 a.m. and we arrived at 10 sharp! We spent 50 minutes at this
museum which is excellent! We then walked to the Nordic Museum which is right
across the street from the Vasa in a large brick building. We really enjoyed
this museum, it's different from most with Christmas exhibit, shoes, china,
clothing. Quite interesting. Next we walked a short way, 6-7 minutes to Skansen
Outdoor museum. Again, this is excellent, but quite large. You can't possibly
see everything here in a short time but it's worth seeing what you have time
for. We did find the reindeer!! We spent 45 minutes here. From Skansen we took
bus 47 (bus stop right in front of Skansen) to the City Hall at the city center.
We asked driver to tell us when to get off. He did happily and pointed to us
which way to walk! It's past the train station. You must go on a guided tour
here and the next was at 2:00 p.m. It was 12:30 so we should have gone to Gamla
Stan first. We had to walk back to Gamla Stan and onto the Royal Palace where we
saw the changing of the guard. The guards talked softly to the tourists. I had
never seen that done before! We went to the Armory to see the large coaches and
wooden sleds. We then walked in Gamla Stan, shopping a bit in this delightful
area of small streets. This is the Old Town of Stockholm. We walked back to the
City Hall for the 2:00 tour. This is a ways, so had to really rush. We had a
tour of the Nobel Prize Banquet hall and city hall council meeting room. It was
a good tour, although a little long. Back to the Royal Palace for us and a tour
of the Treasury with it's small but beautiful crowns and swords. Then we had a
bit more time for Gamla Stan, and a walk back to the ship. My legs desperately
needed a break after all the walking we did today!

Thursday Tallinn Sunny/rainy 62 degrees

We were very tired after yesterday, but still got off the ship a bit before 9:00
as soon as we could. We docked early here. I wanted a Tallinn card but there is
no TI at this dock. Ask for directions to Terminal A where you can buy the card.
We got the card that is good for museums, not the one with the tour included.
One man we knew on the cruise could never find the meeting point for the tour
and was told it's very hard to find. This city is easy to get lost in. To find
Terminal A walk from the ship toward town and shortly upon leaving the gated
area turn left. You're heading for the ferry terminal D. walk toward it, but
when you can see Terminal A turn left towards it. It's not far. 10 minutes at
most from the ship. Inside terminal A is a TI and money changing station. Buy
and Sell at good, fair rates. They bought US$'s at $14Kroon and sold for $15
which was only a 3% markup. We only changed $20 USD and got 280 EEK. It was all
we needed for the day! The 6 hour Tallinn card covered all museum entrances and
buses. We never needed a bus. The card was 60 EEK or $4 US. We walked to town, a
very easy walk, past Fat Margaret. They have excellent Matryosha nesting dolls
at many shops here. Expect to pay around $55-60 USD for a nice stack of 5
though.
We walked through the Old town up to Toompea, Tallinns fortified hill. The view
is superb!! Postcard girls are everywhere. Buy postcards from them, they are so
sweet. We met on from Georgia. She's trying to support herself and eventually
follow her older sister to the US.
Excellent sites here are kiek in de kok, with a photography exhibit, medieval
cannons left over from the Livonian wars, and other interesting exhibits. St.
Nicholas Church with WW II ruins behind it, Dome Church, Russian Orthodox
Church, Holy Ghost Church with old outdoor clock, Estonian History Museum,
Tallinn Town Museum, among others. At each site, they wrote down the # of our
Tallinn card. There is still plenty of time to wander and shop. It's easy to get
lost here, which we did a lot. The shop selling CD's of Estonia Music was gone,
empty shop now. I asked a waiter at Old Hansa, a restaurant many enjoyed, where
I could buy CD's. He told us of Black Market ones under the bridge between Old
town and New town! Visit a pastry shop for the best cookies! .35 each, for a
cake base, fruit filling, meringue and then covered in chocolate!!

We found the internet in Tallinn! A unique experience. We had asked at the TI in
town center where it was. She gave us directions of which street to go to. We
did, but couldn't find the internet. Asked at the spa, and hair salon on this
street. They didn't know. Well, I finally found it, next door to the hair salon.
It's a single door, looks like an old Russian apt. building. On the small sign
if you look carefully it says internet. The shops right next to it don't even
know it's there! Walk up 4 flights of steps in this old building, and down a
long, old hallway with many doors. At the end of the hall is an excellent
internet center with 5-6 computers. High speed. 30 minutes was $1.50!!! Great
after the .50 a minute internet on the ship. It was an easy, relaxing walk back
to the ship.

Friday St. Petersburg, Russia!! Partly cloudy 57 degrees

Again, we didn't want to do ship tours. We looked into and got information from
Red October and Denrus. Both e-mailed us their itineraries and prices, which
were quite high. It was still early and we couldn't find anyone to team up with.
Then I saw posts about Palladium and heard many good things about them. You do
need to get Russian Visas, but their prices were great for 2 people. $10 hour
for guide and $12 hour for car and driver. We decided to go with them for part
of the time. They gave us free visa support. We e-mailed our information and
they faxed the necessary paperwork. We filled out the application and sent it
along with Travel vouchers and a passport sized picture, I cut from a mat
finish, photograph I had taken with $100 each and our passport to the Russian
consulate in New York via Fed Ex. 2 weeks later we had our passports back with
the Russian Visas inside. Follow the instructions and it's not bad at all.

It was so exciting, now we could go tour on our own and have total freedom to do
what we wanted!! Almost everyone I corresponded with said don't do it, it's to
hard. Well, it wasn't hard, but easy the way we did it. We did have to plan
ahead a lot though.

We had Palladium pick us up at the ship the first day. They need a gate pass to
do this which is $25 a day. We were going to meet them at the port gate, which
is very easy to do, but decided to have them get the pass for l day so they
could return us to the ship at 11 p.m. that night. A wise choice. We met at 8:30
a.m. but we got off the ship as soon as we were allowed so we wouldn't be behind
many people on ship tours going through the same custom lines. There are only 2
lines. We had NO problem with customs. They looked at our visa, stamped the
white paper attached and sent us on our way. We waited outside the customs house
for 30 minutes for our guide. It would be okay to meet at 8 a.m. if you want.
Our driver and guide were excellent! Elena, our guide was so smart, had so many
facts to tell us. She has been only married for l year and has traveled a lot
outside of Russia. We think she was from a well to do family. The guides must
have individual passes for each site you visit, and they must take a test every
year to renew their guide passes. We could have not been happier with her
services. I had some phrases for her to translate for us into Russian for the
time we'd be on our own, and she happily did it.

We started out with a city tour covering everything imaginable. We also went
into several churches and saw services going on. Quite interesting. Each church
was different from the last. We stopped at many sites and took pictures. It
rained a bit. Then we drove out to Peterhof, stopping at Chelsma Church on the
way. It's a pink and white striped church, looks like a candy cane! Small and
quaint. We went inside during the service. In front of this church new drivers
were taking "drivers ed" and learning how to do 3 point turns, etc. It was fun
to see. We saw very old apt. buildings along the roads, and summer houses with
their gardens. They also looked old to me. We saw Peter and Paul cathedral
across from Peterhof, a large and beautiful church. We loved Peterhof and it's
fountains! Don't miss this, a real highlight. We had plenty of time to walk the
gardens and see many, many fountains, and the trick fountains the kids were
enjoying. Yes, we got wet here!! There are bathrooms here but you must get the
tp in the lobby area first. None in the stalls. Most people didn't realize it
and were without! We had local currency and need it to pay for admissions and
restroom facilities. After Peterhof we drove back to St. Petersburg where we had
Palladium drop us off at the Hermitage. We had bought tickets ahead of time on
the internet. This way you don't have to stand in line. It's also good to take
pictures with. Elena took our e-mail confirmation and used her guide pass to
walk us in that entrance, right to the ticket window without waiting and got our
tickets. This was so nice of her, over and above service! She wished us well,
gave us some tips on what to see, although I had the Lonely Planet book and had
it all planned out. We were here at 1:30 p.m. There weren't many people here
since it was lunch time. We checked our backpack. In this area there is also a
money exchange desk. We changed more US$ into rubles. The exchange rate was very
fair. We had started with $100 US$ amount we changed at our airport bank into
rubles. We used the lonely planet map of the museum which I had highlighted all
the rooms we wanted to see. It was easy to follow, we felt we saw all of the
highlights with no problem, spending about 3 hours here. It wasn't hot, and when
we needed to ask the Russian women in the room, guarding it, where stairs were
etc. they were very helpful. We used hand signs to communicate! They even
smiled! We left the museum and found a bench just outside in a small park by the
building and sat and had a lunch I had brought from the ship. We were in St.
Petersburg with no guide eating lunch at the Hermitage! It was a thrill! It's
important to bring bottled water also. We walked to St. Isaacs next, found it
easily, bought tickets, no line. Buy the tickets up the steps on side opposite
the Bronze horseman statue. Don't stand in line with the Russians on the street.
You must also buy a separate ticket for your camera if you want to take
pictures. Do so. Excellent mosaics here but not as good as Church on Spilled
Blood. We shopped at the street market across the street next. They were getting
ready to close up, but I bargained well and got 2 sets of very nice Matryoshka
nesting dolls, hand painted for $50. They started out asking for $50 USD each,
but I got 2 sets for that price in the end. They'll bargain if you get more than
l. I had wanted 3 so it helped in the bargaining, but ended up with two. They
like USD, but the rate is same for rubles or $, no mark up for $. We asked them
for directions to the Moya, yes they spoke English well! We walked here
following the canal. We felt like we were walking in an older Paris, very
simular. We felt very safe, just had to watch for traffic. We went to the Moya
canal where the bridge crosses Nevsky Prospect. Here we joined others for a
canal cruise. 1 hour for $7. They would wait until the boat was full before
they'd leave. There is a small canal side cafe for drinks as you wait. We only
waited about 20 minutes. It was a small boat, holding about 20 people at most.
The guide was a Russian woman giving the tour live for over an hour of non stop
talking. They thought she was quite funny also! We couldn't understand a word,
but it didn't matter a bit. We cruised the small canals and the Neva. It was
excellent. It was getting cool so they gave everyone a wool blanket, and when it
started to rain just a bit, they handed out umbrellas! This was great fun. We
had theater tickets later for a folkdance show at Nikolayevsky Palace at Truda
Square, 4. This was an excellent show, the best folkdance show we've ever seen!
The had many, many costume changes, dances and singing. Even a comedic guy in a
costume after intermission, falling on people, including me in the audience! It
was great fun. They show was 2 hours with a break for champagne, vodka, fruit,
and desserts. Before the show though we went to the Astoria hotel and cleaned
up. Then we walked through the city some before going to the Palace. We knew
where it was since Palladium showed us the location earlier in the day. It was
very close to the Neva river west of St. Isaccs. At 11 p.m. our driver from
Palladium picked us up at the palace and drove us back to the ship. The streets
were deserted so we were happy not to have to find our own taxi back.
Saturday St. Petersburg, cloudy, no rain, 57 degrees

Today we met a walking guide at the port gates. To get to the gate from the ship
was simple and free. The taxis usually will charge $10 to go to the gate. They
may ask for more, but $5-$10 is usual. If you want to go for free, simply get on
the old port bus. The bus stopped right in front of the ship to the left of
where all the tour buses line up for ship tours. There is a blue wooden building
that is the bus stop. We waited about 10 minutes for the bus to arrive. As we
were waiting 2 employees from the ship also came and waited with us. When we
asked the purser on the ship where the bus stop would be, they said, no, no you
don't want to use the bus, it's very old. We told them we didn't care if it was
old, but they wouldn't answer our ?. Just must find it on your own, but it's
very easy to spot. We hopped on the bus and 5 minutes later it was at the port
gate. It was free. Customs at the ship was again easy, and the Russian customs
official even laughed with me at my passport picture, which looks nothing like I
do today! And who said they don't smile!

You show your passport again at the gate. Keep the blue paper with your cabin #
on it that the ship gives you the night before you arrive in Russia. We passed
on through and met our walking guide, Olga Stepanova. I had found her on the
internet, she is also recommended highly on the Fodders sight. She usually uses
a car and driver, but that's not what we wanted. We wanted to tour by metro and
bus. We had thought about doing this on our own, but we still had so much to see
we decided before we left to use Olga to help us get around quicker. She's a
fully licensed guide and I sent her a list of what we wanted to do ahead of
time. She charged $10 an hour, a bargain. We walked from the port gate straight
out to the street where we crossed the road and she flagged down a mini-bus.
It's just a van that is used as a mini bus for people. I think it was #41, not
sure though. The 2 people who worked on the ship ended up doing the same thing,
but got the next bus. We took this mini-bus for .50 each to the center of the
city, to the metro. Rides inside the city are .25. We took the metro to
Kuznechnyy rynok indoor market. It's a fruit, vegetable, meat, dried fruits,
flower market. We had great fun here. The dried fruit stall had 3 men working in
it who were just delighted at us Americans being there. They sold us fruits and
told us they were Saddam Hussein figs! They knew they were punching our
buttons!! We had a fun time with them though. I got one dirty look from the
artistic vegetable stall when I took a picture here, but very friendly cheese
ladies. We tasted the nasty, soft cottage cheese stuff. Not good. Olga couldn't
figure out why we wanted to go here, but she took us anyhow! She has her
opinions, but will comply to what you want. Just insist kindly, she's a
pushover! Next we took the metro to Alexander Nevsky Monastery and Tikhvin
Cemetery. I guess I made a mistake here when I took pictures in the metro. Greg
and Olga were buying tickets, a card for 3 rides and I snapped a couple of
pictures. A metro guard rushed out of his office looking for me. Saw me, but
didn't know it was I taking the pictures, and left. Then I asked Olga if
pictures were ok. They don't like them, but I could if not caught! The metro
used to be used as a bomb shelter so they're still protective. The metro is very
deep. Olga was great, she didn't talk nonstop, and we got to talk to her about
her life, not just about the sites we visited. She's been a guide for 15 years.
We found bathrooms at a hotel, nice and clean, then hopped a mini bus again,
this time to Peter and Paul Cathedral and Fortress. We drove down Nevsky
Prospect with Olga pointing out more sights, which we would come back to later
in the day, walking. We had a good visit inside the cathedral seeing the tombs
of Peter the great and family, the cells, and the fortress. I got my picture
taken in the lap of Peter the Great statue with the small head and big body!
Olga really doesn't like this statue, but I told her tourists do! We took the
mini bus to the Church on Spilled Blood with the most beautiful mosaics we've
ever seen! A camera ticket is very important here. After finishing our day in
St. Petersburg, walking and seeing so much, Olga got a taxi for us back to the
ship. We didn't want to do the mini-bus back on our own since we would have to
transfer to a 2nd bus and we don't know which corners to catch them at. The taxi
was only $10 to the port gate, where we again, took the bus back to the ship. A
port gate guard came up to us this time and asked if we were Americans. We said
yes, and he said he had a $20 US bill and could we give him change for it. We
both thought, rightfully so, that it was counterfeit and he wanted to pass it to
us, getting real currency. We refused, telling him we were out of US currency,
that we had used rubles, which was true. He kept trying, but finally realized we
weren't going to give him any $. We were almost at the point of thinking we
would have to comply though, so we could go on. When the woman checking our
passports here to go back inside the port was looking at them, he came into the
office, grabbed them from her hands and threw them back at us. Oh well, we were
on our way. We were very, very happy with our time in Russia. I had a list of
many smaller things to see here and using Olga really helped us out.

Sunday Helsinki 57 degrees, cloudy

No time for rest, still exhausted, we were off the ship at 7:30 am. Helsinki
runs shuttles from the ship into the city for $4 one way per person. No one
knows the public bus also goes from the same location, but around the corner for
1Euro each. Just ask the guide at the Helsinki tourist bus there by the ship
where to get the bus. We were in the West Harbor and took bus #16. The Helsinki
site said it would be bus 15A, but it was nowhere to be found so we stopped bus
#16 and this was the correct one. It drops you off on the Esplanade. We later,
at the ferry to Suomenlinna, bought all day transportation passes for $4.80
Euros each. This is a great deal since many bus rides are $2Euros each. This
pass includes the ferry. It was Sunday and very quiet in Helsinki. We did our
own city walking tour, seeing Senate Square and the Lutheran Cathedral, Russian
Orthodox Cathedral, Cafe Kappeli, which was quiet, not crowded. It's a pretty,
but very small city. We shopped in the Market at the Harbor, buying some
wonderful items! Great market. We then took the ferry to Suomenlinna island and
the fortress. Boy was this place dead on a Sunday morning. Most things don't
open until later in the day. I felt bad for those on tour we met here. They paid
$60 for the tour. We ferried back to the harbor and walked to the Swedish
Theater where bus #24 is. Easy to find. We took this bus to the end of the line
which goes to a wonderful wooden bridge you walk across to Seurasaari open air
folk museum. This place is wonderful. Smaller than Skansen in Stockholm, but
everything was open, and the setting is so pretty. It's on it's own island. Many
families were here for the Sunday morning, feeding the squirrels. After seeing
most of the houses we walked to the connecting island which was having an
ancient Viking Festival. It wasn't to good. We then went back to the bus stop.
Walking over the wooden bridge, some cars drove by carrying people dressed as
the wedding party for a wedding to be held in the church at the open air museum.
We took bus #24 back to town, passing the Sibelius Monument. We saw it from the
bus, deciding not to get off since time was running out and we wanted to still
go to Temppeliaukio Church. The church in the rock. We got off the bus and
walked to the Railroad station to take a picture of this fantastic building,
then walked to the church. We got lost, so again asked for directions from a
local who walked us part of the way there. This church has very limited hours on
Sundays, so we were very happy to get inside. It's a wonderful sight. We walked
back to the Esplanade to catch bus #16 back to the port, and arrived at 2:20.
All aboard was at 2:30 so we just made it!

Monday p.m. Copenhagen 60 degrees, sun/clouds/rain

It was a sea day for much of the day, arriving at Copenhagen at 7 p.m. We
rested, sure did need it. We wanted to walk to Tivoli. It was raining though so
we wisely hopped on the public bus #26 which was at the pier. It would be a long
walk for the evening so it was a good decision taking the public bus. We would
have missed the entertainment at Tivoli if we would have walked there. You need
to get passes to get off the ship so everyone doesn't get off at once. They let
a lot of the independent people off at the same time they called the first bus
groups. We loved Tivoli! We got a schedule of events as we walked in the main
gate at the office to the left of the gate. Magic show, bands, pantomime,
acrobats, rides, food, a great place. It's all lit up when the sun goes down.
Great fun. We took the public bus back to the ship that evening.

Tuesday Copenhagen

We wanted to walk the city this day so left the ship at 7:30 and walked to the
Little Mermaid statue. No one else was there so we got good pictures! We walked
onto Nyhavn which we weren't to impressed by. It was early still, I'm noticed it
was much more lively around lunch time. It's just a small area. We didn’t buy
the Copenhagen card here, didn't think it was a good value for what we had
planned. The large fountain was disassembled, being redone. We walked to the Old
Market, New Market area. Old market was a disappointment, not much here. Stroget
was excellent though. Ecco shoe store with $60 shoes!!! I bought 2 pairs. We
walked by the stork fountain, the old phone booth and much more, taking
pictures. Stopped by the railroad station, then walked to City Hall. They were
having a special handwork, art show which we walked through before it opened!
Saw the famous clock through the shear curtains, then walked to Ny Carlsberg
Glyptoteket museum which opened at 10 a.m. We arrived at 10, it was excellent
and not crowded, had a wonderful Gaugin collection along with a lot of sculptor.
Next we walked to the National Museum, again excellent. Don't miss the
prehistoric section on the ground floor. The entrance is by the lockers, it's
the best part of the museum and a bit difficult to find. It has bog people, rue
stones and so much more. Walked down the Stroget again, stopping for a Carlsberg
Beer rest! We then walked to the Rosenburg Castle. This looks to be far away on
the map, but it isn't. Just ask for directions. We toured the castle and the
crown jewels, in another area here. There is a nice, big lawn here you can relax
on. The 3rd floor of the castle is the highlight, after the crown jewels. From
here we walked to a church with frescos, could have skipped this, then onto the
Resistance Museum by the fort. This is in a dark wood building, hard to spot at
first. We enjoyed this museum much more than the one in Oslo. They won't take
credit cards here without a European pin # so don't run out of currency. We used
our last to buy tickets here. We walked back to the ship and got our VAT back at
the shops across from the ship.

We met Captain Zini’s Mother and Father in law on our Deck 8. They were
wonderful people, his mother in law was so much fun talking to!!

This was a wonderful trip. So very much to see. We used Rick Steves Scandinavia
book and Lonely Planet book also for planning. The best maps are in Lonely
Planet. It took a lot of planning, but it was so worthwhile when everything just
fell into place! I wouldn't do anything different, but we did come home
exhausted.

We spent 3 days in London after the cruise. We saw Mama Mia, and Chicago and did
a London walks Pub walk. We went to Brighton for a fun day, also with London
walks, and went to Greenwich which is an easy trip and very worthwhile.

Hopefully this review will help some of you plan your ports independently!